Blogging the San Diego Padres… established 1997

Me, Elsewhere: Eichelberger and Salveson

My latest edition of This Week in Minor League History is up at Baseball Prospectus, and it features a couple of former Padres. On May 26, 1984, Juan Eichelberger, then with the Milwaukee Brewers organization, threw a no-hitter for Vancouver. Eichelberger won 20 games for the Padres from 1978 to 1982. His shining moment came on June 6, 1982, against the Cubs, when he finished a Scot Thompson single shy of a big-league no-no.

The other ex-Padre was someone I’d not heard of before researching the article. Right-hander Jack Salveson played for the Pacific Coast League Padres in 1952 and 1953. On May 25, 1952, he won his 200th PCL game. Salveson, then 38 years old, went 10-10 with a 3.80 ERA for the Padres in ’52. He appeared in a handful of games for San Diego and Oakland the following year before retiring.

I play adult baseball in San Diego. Our team consists of guys who have played together for years, dating back to the mid 80′s, playing little league baseball. We’re in our 30′s now and we still love playing the game. We’re still competitive and we have solid players in every position. One of the best memories we have playing Adult Baseball (SDABL / MSBL) was when we faced former major league pitcher, Juan Eichelberger. That week before the game, we heard we’d face a former pro, and San Diego Padre. We took extra hacks in the cages that week but despite our best efforts, Juan shut our offence down. It was a lot of fun to face a former pro pitcher. Even though he no longer had his ‘best stuff’ Juan still brought it. It was awesome to get a glimpse of what it would be like to face a major league pitcher. We did get another shot at Juan a couple months later. We had a lot more success this time and actually were able to give Juan the loss that day. We still talk about facing Eichelberger to this day, as he was one of the best pitchers we ever faced. I think he was on the SDABL A’s and we played on the San Diego Players (and still do). If he reads this, it was awesome playing against you and I hope you are doing well.